News briefs

Dousing alcohol abuse

Among the best: A Penn program addressing alcohol abuse was cited by a publication that goes to college and university presidents around the country. The student-designed program -- a joint effort of the Drug and Alcohol Resource Team (D.A.R.T.), Students Together Against Acquaintance Rape (S.T.A.A.R.) and the Panhellenic and Interfraternity councils -- was recognized as an "exemplary campus-based effort" in the category of Environmental and Targeted Approaches, by the 1997-98 edition of the "Promising Practices Sourcebook."

Virtual archaeology

"Even Indiana Jones would feel at home in Penn's museum Web page."

So said USA Weekend journalist Cesar G. Soriano, in an item naming the University of Pennsylvania Museum one of the top six of 8,000 museum Web sites in the country.

The site includes virtual exhibitions, a game for virtual-artifact sleuths, and information and graphics about Museum research conducted around the world.

Trumpeting kitsch

Those candy-colored '50s and '60s motels in the Wildwoods along the Jersey shore are no longer tacky. They're historic. At least that's the point of Steven Izenour, a professor of architecture, and nine students, who, with professors and students from Yale, have released the first half of a year-long study for promoting the Wildwoods.

Their plan is to celebrate the kitsch -- the neon, the flat-roofed, trailer-shaped motels, the plastic palm trees -- by exaggerating it. The New York Times reported that Wildwood officials endorsed the plan. The neon signs will grow, as will the plastic palms (and you thought plastic couldn't grow), and the buildings will glow with fresh, brighter paint.

Penn Current Express

Quoted Recently

“More companies are asking how they can separate themselves from the organization and instead tighten their connection to the game. The brand of FIFA is problematic but the game of soccer is still popular.”

— Kenneth L. Shropshire, director of the Wharton Sports Business Initiative, on how the FIFA corruption scandal has caused some sponsors to be less concerned about partnering with the powerful soccer organization. FIFA tends to have the most leverage when negotiating deals with companies, but experts are wondering whether sponsors will be able to demand clauses that allow them to leave in cases of corruption. (The Los Angeles Times, June 3, 2015)